Apple Opens Everyone Can Code Initiative to Students Around the World

Australia’s RMIT Joins More Than 20 International Universities in Adopting Apple Curriculum

Apple® today announced the global expansion of its Everyone Can Code initiative to more than 20 colleges and universities outside of the US. These schools will now offer the App Development with Swift Curriculum, a full-year course designed by Apple engineers and educators to teach coding and app design to students of all levels and backgrounds. Now hundreds of thousands of students from around the world gain the opportunity to become proficient in the Swift™ programming language and build the fundamental skills they need to pursue careers in the booming app economy.

RMIT University, Australia’s largest higher education institution, is one of the broadest international deployments of the App Development with Swift Curriculum to date. As part of its commitment to improving digital literacy, starting this month RMIT will offer the App Development with Swift curriculum through RMIT Online, and a new vocational course will be taught on campus. RMIT will also offer scholarships for school teachers who want to learn coding, and a free summer school course at RMIT’s City campus will give secondary students the chance to learn the basics of coding.

RMIT joins more than 20 international universities who are also offering the curriculum to students this year, including Mercantec in Denmark, Hogeschool van Arnhem en Nijmegen in the Netherlands, Unitec Institute of Technology in New Zealand and Plymouth University in the UK.

“We launched the Everyone Can Code initiative less than a year ago with the ambitious goal of offering instruction in coding to as many people as possible. Our program has been incredibly popular among US schools and colleges, and today marks an important step forward as we expand internationally,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “We are proud to work with RMIT and many other schools around the world who share our vision of empowering students with tools that can help them change the world.”

“App Development with Swift will play a crucial role in helping RMIT’s students use their creativity and entrepreneurship to prepare for success in the 21st century workforce,” said Martin Bean CBE, RMIT University vice chancellor and president. “These are the sort of skills Australians need for the jobs of the future, and we’re thrilled to work with Apple to deliver this important curriculum.”

“I’m so excited to have the chance to begin learning with Apple’s App Development curriculum, and for the opportunities it could open for my future,” said Tenisha Fernando, fourth year RMIT student. “The Swift programming language is used by developers to create some of the world’s best apps, and it would be great to join them in sharing my own ideas.”

App Store® customers have now downloaded more than 180 billion apps and Apple has paid out over $70 billion to developers since the store launched in 2008, making it the most vibrant software marketplace in the world. More than 500 million unique customers from 155 countries visit the App Store every week.

Apple revolutionized personal technology with the introduction of the Macintosh in 1984. Today, Apple leads the world in innovation with iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch and Apple TV. Apple’s four software platforms — iOS, macOS, watchOS and tvOS — provide seamless experiences across all Apple devices and empower people with breakthrough services including the App Store, Apple Music, Apple Pay and iCloud. Apple’s more than 100,000 employees are dedicated to making the best products on earth, and to leaving the world better than we found it.

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AppleRyan James, [e-mail] Young, [e-mail]